Sabres win third straight, beat Isles 2-1
By Rick Anderson
Sunday, Novermber 7, 1999

After starting the season 0-5-2, the Buffalo Sabres are now just one game under .500 as they squeaked by the New York Islanders 2-1 last night at Marine Midland Arena. Martin Biron is now 5-1 in goal for the Sabres as he made 24 saves in a solid effort to help preserve the Sabres third win in a row.

"I wasn't part of the slump, but you feel it when you're four or five games below .500," said Biron. "Everybody's been playing well lately. Guys are skating well and we're playing solid defense. We talked about it before the game. We had given up a lot of goals in our last game even though we still ended up winning it. Tonight we took pride of playing 60 minutes of hockey."

Curtis Brown moves in to take a shot on Felix Potvin

With Biron expected to be the go-to guy in the nets for Buffalo until Hasek returns from his groin injury in 2 or 3 months, people are wondering if he will ever get his Rochester Amerks mask repainted to the Sabres colors.

"The new one's not ready," Biron replied to the question about his red-white and blue AHL mask. "I got one in training camp that was painted with the Sabres logo but it was too small. I don't think another mask will change anything."

An added feature to this game was the Biron vs. Biron aspect. Marty's younger brother, Mathieu (19), was in the lineup on defense for the Islanders. The 6-6, 212 pound rookie dwarfs his older brother who stands at 6-1, 154 pounds.

"It reminded me when I was in junior playing against a best friend," Martin said. "It was fun, I'm sure my parents were really proud in the stands tonight watching both of us playing in the NHL. We've never played against each other in an organized hockey game."

Mathieu did put 3 shots on net, but his brother wearing the star-spangled mask had no trouble stopping them.

"It was pretty interesting for the both of us," said Mathieu. "It was real tight in the neutral zone, there wasn't much space. My brother made some good saves, unfortunately."

The Sabres drew first-blood as Brian Holzinger charged in hard to knock a rebound of Geoff Sanderson's shot through Islander goalie Felix Potvin. Sanderson got a nice pass from Eric Rasmussen and he made a bee-line right towards Potvin. Potvin made a good stop on Sanderson's backhand but Holzinger crashed into the crease and pounded it into the net. It was Holzinger's first goal in 27 games.

"You know you have to go to the net hard, because there's not going to be an in-the-crease rule," said Holzinger after the contest. "Obviously when you're not scoring it's nice to get that one in. I knew it was going to be an ugly one. Geoff actually had the defense beat. He put the shot on net. Potvin lost sight of it and I just went to the net and put it in. It was just sitting there and I crashed the net."

The Curtis Brown scored a powerplay goal in the first period, but had it taken away when he got tagged with a holding-the-stick penalty.

With both teams with a man in the penalty box, the Islanders got a 2-on-1 break into the Buffalo zone. Mariusz Czerkawski charging in on the right side made a picture-perfect pass to Mats Lindgren, who one-timed it into the open side of the net as Biron couldn't slide over quick enough. If there is one weakness to Biron's game it is his inability to get from side to side as quickly as Dominik Hasek can.

"It's a tough situation," said Miro Satan. "Nobody can be as good as Dominik, but Martin is handling things pretty well. It's a great feeling to know we are not going to be weak at the position. We can just concentrate on our hockey and play as well as we can." Less than two minutes later, the Sabres got a gift as 6'-9" Zdeno Chara fumbled the puck behind his own net and it slid to within a couple inches in front of the goal line. Miroslav Satan pounced on it and blasted it past a dazed Potvin at the 12:07 mark for his seventh of the season.

"I tried to stall behind the net, you saw what happened, I lost the puck," said an embarrassed Chara. "I thought I had it, stopped it from rolling. I feel bad. Bad things happen in hockey. We played hard. I don't feel real good right now."

"We haven't had much luck, and tonight was typical of how we have lost games," said Islanders coach Butch Goring. "It was a bad break and an unfortunate play, and it ended up in our net."

That goal was good enough to stand, but the Sabres kept putting more pressure on Potvin and the former Leafs goalie stood tall. The Sabres could have walked away from this game if Potvin hadn't played so spectacular after Satan's goal.

Martin blocks a shot in victory over Islanders

Meanwhile, Biron had it relatively easy at the other end of the ice. Having to make 24 saves, the 22-year old kid trying to establish himself as a permanent fixture in Buffalo did what it took to preserve the win. In the first period, Biron made a great stop on Eric Brewer as he got a quick shot on net after receiving a pass from Jorgen Jonsson. Biron made another great save in the first stanza when he blocked a point-blank shot by Chris Ferraro who was parked just outside the crease.

"All during the third period when they had some momentum, we got the puck in deep," Biron said. "We started banging them again. We didn't give them much, and that was the reason why we won. . . . I'm really glad to see we can play with a one-goal lead like that."

Biron was named the first star in the game, but will always remember this one as his first NHL game against his younger brother.

"It's the first time we've played against each other in the game, other than playing in the street ," said Marty about when they played street hockey as kids. "My mother was saying that the last time we played together, he came home crying."

As for the three shots Mathieu put on him, Martin said, "I wouldn't hear the end of it. I think he's been playing really well. I'm really happy for him. For him to stay with the team at 19 is great. He's going to get a lot of experience."

The brothers' parents came all the way down from Quebec for Saturday's game.

"I'm happy with three wins in three games," Satan said. "That's excellent. That's a good step for us. We can still improve in some areas of our game, but hopefully it's going to get better and this team is starting to have solid games."

Lindy Ruff seems happy with the way things have been going for his team as of late. Ruff said in his post-game conference, "You look at the record before we left on the road trip (earlier in the week), and if you go .500 in the three games you're no further ahead. But for us to win all three puts us one game under .500 and gets you right back in the playoff picture."

"The scoring chances for us are going up, and the scoring chances against are going down. We were averaging 18 or 19 chances for, and the opposition has been in the low teens. There's been a couple of games where we kept them to 10 or 11. When you start outplaying teams in that category, typically you start winning. Sometimes you can get beat because the goaltender has a great night.

"Discipline-wise, we haven't taken a lot of penalties to get us in trouble. Usually, when you get those things in your favor, sooner or later it's going to turn your way."

Buffalo outshot the Islanders 32-25 and could have easily walked away with this one. The Sabres, who had a bad tenancy to beat the good teams but lose to the weak ones last year, seem to be out of that funk. Teams like the Black Hawks and the Islanders seemed to upset the Sabres last year, but that was not to be the case last night.

"We really grinded it out today. It wasn't the prettiest win," Michael Peca said. "I'm pretty happy with the end result the last three games. I think the confidence level is increasing. You see it in a lot of individuals. (Losing is) a learning process, but it's good to see us come out of it."

"Things are really starting to come together for us," Holzinger said. "Anytime your star player goes out of the lineup, everybody tends to regroup and bring up their level of play."

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